Letter: Agencies steamrolling over Meyers
To the community,
We have two important items to share:
Despite our community’s concerns over public process, the agencies proceeded to hold a meeting [May14] with the Meyers Community Advisory Council (MCAC) without inviting the public.
In this meeting, it was stated that contrary to what our community has been told, we cannot truly limit new development maximums in our Meyers Plan because TRPA will not allow it.
We believe more public meetings – with proper notice and advertisement – are needed to address other plan issues. Also, we feel the agencies should follow through on their promises that we can truly decide our community’s own future.
(That’s the short version. For more details see below).
Otherwise, we were told the updated draft Area Plan will be released to the public next week to follow environmental review requirements. Also, we want to thank the California South Shore Chamber of Commerce for working hard to help our community and business owners. We also encourage other community members who agree to contact the agencies, Supervisor [Norma] Santiago, the newspapers, etc., and ask for a better, open public process for Meyers.
More details:
With less than a day’s notice, we learned of an MCAC meeting being held by TRPA and El Dorado County to discuss the updated Meyers Area Plan draft. Although apparently not open to the public, a handful of community members were able to attend and allowed to raise concerns and questions. (Note: the full MCAC was not in attendance).
As has been our concern all along, we pressed for more public engagement, more open, public meetings, and the chance for the full community to better understand, and work through, the remaining unresolved issues in the Meyers Plan – before it’s pushed forward to the legal/environmental processes (the farther along it gets, the more difficult it becomes to change it).
Most of you may recall Supervisor Santiago and others telling us that we get to decide our own plan. However – we learned [Wednesday] that this is not quite correct.
Although the Meyers Area Plan can include limits on larger future developments (such as commercial floor area, new hotel rooms called Tourist Accommodation Units [TAUs], etc.) in order to support small businesses, TRPA staff told us the Meyers community cannot include language in our Area Plan to truly limit new developments in Meyers because it is TRPA’s “Regional strategy” to allow the transfers and conversions of development (which allow new commercial, tourist, and other development in Meyers beyond the Area Plan’s stated caps).
Unfortunately, there are several regulations in TRPA’s Regional Plan that support the larger, corporate-type developments that it appears most of Meyers does not want, but that will affect us even though not mentioned in the Meyers Area Plan. We believe that the agencies should follow through on their promise and let the Meyers Community decide what type of new businesses and what kind of community we want for our future.
Sincerely,
Meyers residents and business owners
Meyers residents and business owners, You’re correct, “Steamrolling” is exactly what’s happening! Meetings held with little or no public notice, TRPA’s Regional Plan which goes against the wishes of MANY locals and all the while turning a deaf ear to public input from the people that live and work in the area.
Don’t give up! Keep fighting! It’s OUR community, not theirs! OLS
Meyers residents, don’t let the agencies put one over on you. It is your time to be heard loud and clear.
This is the bureaucratic juggernaut they ~ governmental agencies~ are pulling all over the state. Cherry picking areas to ‘pack and stack’ people.
We need to fight for “Our Tahoe” and why we came here in the first place. There is nothing wrong with improving infrastructure but the “gov. bureaucrats” always wants to “Control” your use of YOUR property in the dealings!!!! Stand up!! We are not paying our taxes to employ dictators!!!
Regretfully, government and its agencies have misaligned their priorities and sensible direction to the extent that community issues are now becoming more effectively determined by participatory vote on each at the ballot box. Similar to the City’s misguided parking program in South Lake Tahoe.
Porked
the rest of Lake Tahoe should get ready the Marvelous Makeover is coming to your Hood.
I agree with you folks. We residents of Meyers need to fight for what’s left of “Our Tahoe” and let the people determined to ruin it know we don’t want this. Santiago looked like a balloon, I mean buffoon at the celebration up at Sierra for our girls. I’m convinced she has her own agenda and what we really care about is not in her thoughts. What a shock, a politician with their own agenda and careless with the truth.
I like Marlene’s “pack and stack” analysis.
If you look at the history of small towns especially in the west… they had main streets with two or three story buildings. Commerical on the ground floor, residences on the upper floors.
Slowly this model became less common,but now, in this mountain community, the powers that be want to recreate it. In some ways this makes sense. It is easier to corral more people in multifamily residences, cheaper to keep them warm, keep them out of their cars and walking or biking (the reality of the biking is season limited of course up here).
But I question where the people are going to come from. This model does not work in remote areas without farms, mines, or some central industry to employ workers.
Sacramento, the central valley just about anywhere where there are more people, therefore more jobs and more services would be a better place to put such developments.
We are shrinking, the Casinos, the long time employer that created the memory we are trying to force to come back will not ever be the driving economic force they once were. The agencies who now are the source of most of the higher wage jobs will slowly shrink as the failing economy slowly reduces the tax base that supports them.
But ask yourself, why would middle class Americans come to Tahoe, buy or rent an apartment which is more akin to a New York city tenement than a mountain resort area. These developments are going to be peopled by the service class, the hourly employees who have smaller discretionary incomes and yes, generally more kids.They are NOT the people who buy season passes and fancy meals and rides on the Queen or the tramways for a 40 dollar half hour trip to the top of heavenly.
In most areas these developments are called “The Projects” and rapidly turn into run down trashy places, where the younger ones hang out on the corners, out of work, desperate Bored. No privacy, the term section 8 housing comes to mind. Values drop, the situation gets worse.
I think it is stupid to try to force feed a small mountain area with the level of care and services you might expect, say, in Roseville or similar. People will be more apt to come here to get away from that kind of thing.
Tahoe is far more likely in my opinion to go once again into a playground for the 1 percenters, like it was at the turn of the century when all the mansions and even a railroad were build by bankers and tycoons for almost entirely seasonal use.
The line from the movie “if you build it they will come” seems to be the unspoken background for all the TRPA planning going on now. It did work at the beginning of the 1960s with the vaunted Olympics, and we are still living with the fallout of all that, but we are at the bust instead of the Boom.
Unlikely to recover….regulated out of business, with the biggest business being the regulators themselves. Evan then more seasonal employees than permanent.
Maybe the regulators really do want to run all except themselves out so the lake returns to their ideal.
I apologize for what has become a bit of a ramble, but I think the readers can see a lot to agree with.
Marlene@Tahoe & Observer, You both bring up good points.The “pack and stack” metaphor is quite appropriate as well as “Our Tahoe”. Couldn’t agree more!
Observer, yes, the casinos are shrinking, but I’m glad to hear the Park brothers are trying to bring back the old Sahara with a renovation.Don’t know if they’ll make a go of it but I guess it’s worth a try.
As far as Meyers goes? From what I’ve read we’re holding the short end of the stick, as the big money won out. Doesn’t it always?
So TRPA and all the other associated agencies, developers, politicians, consultants, lawyers and investors, you won and South Lake Tahoe lost., big time!!! You rats will slink back into your hidey holes, while you rub your hands in glee with the filthy money youstole thru bribes and coercion, and think of ways to exploit and destroy the west and east shore of this once beautiful lake. You greedy sumbitches can all go to hell for all I care!!!
Sorry Kae, just had to get that off my chest! I don’t mind if it’s censored. OLS
These Agency’s urgency and hidden agenda is to swiftly ram this through to meet deadlines for more Calif. Strategic Growth Council Grant Funding for their collaboration – and push through more of the same………..
That’s right people – they’re being grant funded with our tax dollars to behave this way !!
How’s that for boldness ?
OMG! It’s GODZILLA! No worse! It’s that Meyers Community Advisory Council that has been around for 20 years actually working on the plan! OMG! Someone might build something that is 3 stories high! Quick, where are our CC&R’s for Meyers? Nobody does anything without our permission!
Time is short. . .SNPLMA money, not to mention the Lake Tahoe Restoration Act, are not kicking into gear (in the first instance, gone; in the second, not yet)…
Strategic Growth Council funding is used to further inner preferences (as time is short, along with funds), along with FHWA (Federal Highway Administration) funds of $ 600,000 – already doled out ($ 200,000 for more Meyers “planning”, 100,000++ to LTUSD, 150,000 + to the Sustainability Collaborative (?), and a few other “community” efforts – now gone…
Get as much done as possible, before the well runs dry. . . and too many people notice. . .(but they do)
So sad. . .
I really thought Meyers had a huge ability with so many full time residents to truly create a Community they desired.
It should be illegal for TRPA to have a Regional Plan that provides the maximum development instead of the minimum amount of development. Handing the decisions to local government is a “crazy” idea! Look at Placer County, they are enlarging Squaw Valley, Alpine Meadows, Northstar to creep into the Tahoe Basin all while enlarging with massive hotels and Resort Recreation in Tahoe City and Kings Beach. Placer County isn’t listening either because as we all know Lake Tahoe amounts to a “Golden Cash Cow” for developers and the local government. Especially since the Supervisor already saved her precious Royal Gorge.
Remember when the League actually acted against TRPA at times, when Rochelle had articles that TRPA was a “Build Baby Build” Regional Plan. Well, the League is now so close to TRPA you’re not sure who is leading and we’ve got to fight harder than ever to keep places like Meyers and other areas a true Community as they have requested!!! This Regional Plan is nothing like what the Compact designed with preservation of the thresholds. Shame on TRPA!
As bad as I hate to say it….Meyers needs to incorporate as a city, with its own master plan approved by the residents. Will the people in the Meyers area hang together on this? We won’t know until we try.
The incorporation charter could basically set the stage to allow growth and development UNDER the TRPA plan. TRPA’s regional plan could be the maximum, but a city could decide to set its own standards.
Would any court in the land over rule a city’s decision to remain small? This is the part I am afraid of….whoever has the most money wins most of the time.
The first city (Petaluma) to set anti growth rules in California (if I recall correctly) in the 1960s made quite a stir, and it was successful within the city limits.
Thank you Mayor Helen Putnam.
Comments Please!
Sister Sue,
Even if the League has abandoned us, the Sierra Club and Earthjustice are working to save Lake Tahoe. There is hope. Support them.
Sistersue,Hikerchick and Observer, Sistersue and Hikerchick, it seems as though the “League” has been strangely silent recently with all the ongoing “controversy ” on several topics lately,(please say that word “controversy”, the way the good people from England pronounce it, it’s much more fun!) I’ll have to look into Earthjustice.
Observer, I agree, the folks in Meyers need to incorporate and become their own city. Will that fly? Very unlikely. They don’t want to become a city and many are living there not only for it’s beauty and solitude but also because they are NOT a city.
I’m afraid once the developement starts the people with the big bucks will form a city and the locals will not have much of a say in the matter. That’s how the city of So. Lake Tahoe was formed. I know this, because I was here in November 1965 when this little town became a city.
Nasty business , my friend, nasty business indeed. Good luck Meyers!!! OLS
The League endorsed the RPU in 2012 after political agreements were made. They have since become buddies with TRPA. Need an environmental representative to make a technical working group presumably legit? Add the League. It’s unfortunate to see their resources and support used that way.
OLS – Earthjustice attorneys are representing the SC and Friends of the West Shore lawsuit.
Meyers, we need to keep reaching out on this. It seems the supervisory candidates (well, most of them), the Chamber of Commerce, the Tahoe Paradise Park, and a lot of people in Meyers have asked that the plan be put on hold, and to get more community input. And yet the agencies respond with a back-room MCAC meeting? Really? And, it seems pretty clear the MCAC has not been instructed to be the ‘liaison’ to the community the agencies want to rely on, so why are they still being used to push forward the new plan? (Is it so they can take the blame instead of the agencies when Meyers doesn’t like it?).
What will it take for the agencies to listen to what our community, and those speaking up for us like the Chamber, are saying? TRPA and EDC – what’s the rush??
Lets take the time to get the Meyers Area Plan right. Poor planning=bad results like the “Stateline Hole in the Ground”.
The process to revise the MAP has become deeply flawed as noted by others above and has strayed from the Goal and Policies hammered out over the last 25 years.
Adhoc decisions to ram revisions through are being made by the TRPA, El Dorado County and the MCAC.Decisions that bear no resemblance to good planning and the Goals and Policies of MAP itself.
The community of Meyers is being treated like a poor country cousin left out in the cold.
To OLSkiis, the battle has just been joined, don’t give up the ship or the long boards.